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West
As one travels westward from the Blessed Isle, islands are at first large and common, but grow smaller and less frequent the further west one travels. Past a certain point, there are no more islands, only a horizon where the sea and sky come together which can be distinguished only at sunrise and sunset. Even experienced sailors find it maddening to sail too far out, for what is there to find save more ocean stretching out unto the end of time? The People The average Westerner is bronze-skinned, with Far West or Southwest inhabitants having an almost golden skin tone. Central Westeners have seas-shade hair tones (greens, blues and dark gray) while those farther north or south have darker shades (primarily purple and black). Clothing is oriented toward practical shipboard wear - lightweight and restricting no movement. Culture Western culture is frequently patriarchal, with women’s roles in the community being well defined if not actually confining. Visiting women from outside a particular island are often treated as honorary males for the duration of their visit to minimize the cultural impact, but they are encouraged to remain in the foreigners’ quarter of town rather than test local hospitality. Religion Westerners give offerings to the sea spirits, bow spirits of their ships, spirits of wind, weather and good fortune, and any other spirits who may have a bearing on the situation. Life in the West The West is the least populous of all directions, simply due to less land mass. Lack of arable land makes vegetables other than cultivated kelp a luxury. In the Southwest and the Northwest, stretches of temperate land allow for widespread cultivation, before the mountains and deserts of the true South or the frozen wastes of the North make such farming a losing proposition. Political units in the true West are based on the island, with each island or archipelago forming its own independent nation. While not everyone is a sailor, pirate, shipwright or fishermen, the sea cannot be ignored. A child who cannot sail a boat by the age of six is a child poorly raised. Many nations entertain the pirate trade, though only Wavecrest and the Neck allow non-aligned pirates to openly enter port. (They and the outright pirate nation of the Lintha, that is with its secret port of Bluehaven, whose location is said to constantly change.) Major States The Neck * Population: * Leader: * Gods: * Threats: A peaceful, innocent collection of tiny islands, where its inhabitants survive by finding and gathering kelp. A tributary to the Realm that pays in cowry shells and coral beads, for the inhabitants have nothing else to give. It has frequent contact with ocean spirits and water elementals, and many inhabitants are the telltale signs of descent from spirit or divine parents. Coral Archipelago * Population: 200,000 (over 24 islands) * Leader: * Gods: the Ocean Father * Threats: A lawless pirate haven where status is measured by wealth. Wavecrest Archipelago * Population: 250,000 * Leader: * Gods: * Threats: Skullstone Archipelago * Population: * Leader: * Gods: * Threats: The An-Teng Principalities * Population: * Leader: * Gods: * Threats: Minor States The Southwest and Northwest are coastal nations rather than islands, which range from Realm-affiliated principalities to petty kingdoms or republics ruled by Dynastic Dragon-Blooded offshoots. Such nations become more agriculturally oriented the farther south one goes. War between island- or land-based nations is a permanent condition in the West, even if many of the nations are tributaries of the Realm to some degree. Human raids aside, the Fair Folk and water spirits are a permanent menace to the nations of the West, moving more easily than humans through the seas and the Wyld to seek fresh prey to quench their constant hungers. In the First Age, huge warships of orichalcum and jade drove across the waves, propelled by elementals of wind and fi re, and lost sorceries built magical gates between distant islands or grew crops from the dry coral. When the Solars fell, their distant laboratories were lost or destroyed with them. The few that survive were taken over by the Dragon-Blooded, but they no longer operate at their full capacity. As crop capacities and shipping degraded, nations were forced to turn to piracy and preying upon each other to survive, and many once-placid archipelagoes became multiple groups of small islands struggling separately. Somewhere near the southwest coast of the Inland Sea, at the heart of a vast patch of sargasso seaweed, lies Bluehaven, lair of the dreaded Lintha Family. These pirates are the scourge of the sea, and stories of their depredations go back to the First Age. Bluehaven itself is formed from a living island and the hulls of countless ships, some dating to the First Age, the Lintha have linked with a network of walkways to construct their nest at the sargasso’s center. Supporting a population of thousands, it lies amid thickly twining tangles of sargasso seaweed on the ocean’s surface, which traps all ships whose captains do not know the few secret paths. The Lintha Family has been marked by millennia of breeding with spirits, Wyld barbarians or darker things, and it has been twisted by the Wyld energies that pervade the region. Many of the Lintha have blue or green skin, gills or other deformities, and they display them proudly on their raids, exulting in the terror they cause. The Lintha can command giant sea-monsters to serve their will, and between their bloodthirsty weapons and the unwholesome magics that their sorcerers and priests use, few can stand against them in battle. Because many Lintha are wholly comfortable underwater, they are adept at stealthily attacking anchored vessels or small coastal villages. Alternatively, many Lintha pirates use water shoes that allow them to walk on water, permitting them to approach targets freely in calm waters or over the surface of the sargasso field. The Lintha preference is usually to slaughter all opponents and take both vessel and loot. Mercy is a foreign concept to them. The Lintha Family not only engages in piracy, but also forms a vast criminal syndicate stretching from the West through the South. This syndicate fences stolen goods in coastal cities and deals extensively in smuggling and the slave trade. It is easy to join the Family, requiring only small pledges or petty oaths at first, but it’s nearly impossible to leave it. Any member who betrays the Family or flees from it is invariably found dead.